When you think of violence, you probably think of humans fighting each other. It seems that most people always think of humans when it comes to violence, and only in the context of humans fighting other humans. For whatever reason, the majority of people fail to see the inherent violence in all living things because of the biased perception of what the word violence means to them. The reality is, there is always a fight against something when a thing is living. Not only that, in order to perpetuate life, something else has to die, and all living things have to die, and this is destruction, although one could say decomposition or deconstruction. The destruction of life, yes, is what most people would consider violent. However, they only want it to apply to human vs. human interactions, they don’t believe that violence can be applied to things that are not conscious of their own actions like we are. Or even in the case of humans, if they lack the conscious awareness of the destruction of life, they are no longer violent. I want to break down these biased views, clear up what violence actually is, and then apply it as a fundamental to life, and with that, try to come up with some real pragmatic uses for this knowledge.
As you might know, words have a tendency to have more than one definition. Based on the Merriam-Webster, the majority of individuals would point to the first definition of “violence.” This being, “the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy.” This definition is not invalid, however, there is more than one definition. Another, just as valid, and an especially important definition, is, “intense, turbulent, or furious and often destructive action or force.” Yet, in the majority of cases, individuals will only be willing to accept one definition. However, in the context of life being fundamentally violent, I want to shift focus on the second definition. The first definition could be used, but I think it’s important to clear up what violence actually is, and what violence is not.
As simply put as possible, violence is the destruction of life. This could be the destruction of life as a goal to achieve or as a result of being a being that lives. Violence is not only limited to human beings, or only animals, or any limitation that an individual wants to set. By choosing a particular category to apply “violence” as something that happens, rather than as a whole, is a demonstration of the reductionistic thinking common in the modern day. If taking a holistic approach, one realizes that many small aspects of life add up to create the larger aspects of life. Without the small, there is no big, and so if the small is destroyed before the big can arise, there is no big. This becomes relevant because the small things, such as; parasites, germs, bacteria, these all die, whether by our hands or not, whether we intentionally destroy them or not. By killing them, yes, we are killing, it is violence on our hands, and it is unavoidable.
Before going too deep, I want to mention many of the experiences I’ve had trying to bring up violence as a fundamental, a thing that is required in life, and something that can be perceived as part of life. This idea is something I have attempted to present to many individuals, and time and time again, the same things happen, and I want to mention those directly. When presenting the idea that all things are inherently violent, the people I’ve spoken to have always been quick to point at humans. They believe that humans are the only creatures who can perpetuate violence. To them, violence is defined as an action in which human beings destroy other human beings for some higher reason. Whether they kill each other out of God, for money, or out of hate, these are demonstrations of violence, and they believe the word is only relevant to those situations, and nothing outside of those.
Even when bringing up proper definitions of violence, or examples of violence in other animals, the next claim is that animals don’t know they’re committing violence. It somehow wraps back around to the conscious effort to cause harm, but then that’s irrelevant because when men kill animals it somehow is not a violent action. It is only violent when there is intent to cause harm to the other entity, but mostly humans, although some might say animals. Yet, when bringing up this intent to cause harm on entities of a smaller scale, things like ants are somehow ignored. As if stomping on ants is any less violent than someone killing any other type of thing. This is not the case when speaking of violence, at least in the case here. Violence is not to be defined as an emotional reaction to an action which causes harm to something. It is not something which is only applied to human behavior. It most definitely can and will apply to things other than what is the ending or destruction of other life. It does not have to be limited to what hurts people of a conscious effort. With this out of the way, we can begin to acknowledge what violence actually is, and then we can see how those many aspects play into understanding how it is a fundamental characteristic of life.
The things these people have mentioned are violent actions. Human beings fighting each other, killing each other, causing harm upon one another; they are committing violent actions. However, just because these are violent actions does not mean they are the only demonstratable acts of violence. It is also when animals fight one another, chase one another, or eat each other. It is when insects rip each other apart, it is when single celled organisms consume one another. The common trend in all of these things is that there is the ending of life. There could be the intent to end life, or intent to cause excessive harm, and there is usually a purpose, but it is not necessary. We can further break down these qualities; fighting, consumption, the ending of life, and purpose.
Fighting is a common thought when it comes to thinking about violence. Almost everyone can associate violent actions with those with which cause harm, especially with two human beings. However, why are any animals fighting? The reasons can vary, and even with humans alone, there is great variability in the justification of fighting. Fighting can impede into the intent to end life, but in many cases, that isn’t the goal of people fighting. Yes, there are cases like that, but I would put that into the “intent to end life” category. The back-and-forth motion, with intent to cause harm to another party or multiple individuals, is usually because of altercations that caused the belief there is a need to fight. Maybe between two men, one man had sex with a married man’s wife, and so once the husband finds out, he wants to fight the other man. Why would he want to do this?
We could break this down into many layers. For one, the man is probably feeling both anger and anguish. The reasons for those emotions are because he feels he has lost something he has earned, and he wants to prove he is still worthy of the thing he believes he has worked so hard for. Obviously, such ideas are irrational, you don’t earn a wife, and you don’t work for one either. Yet, in his mind, it is because he feels like he wasn’t enough of a man, because if he were, his wife wouldn’t have had sex with another man. This could now be broken down even further, because what are the qualities described to make a man, at least in western society? A feeling of masculinity, superiority, strength, and of power. Due to a lack of these, he might think, he was unable to make his wife believe he was enough of a man, and in order to convince himself he is those things, he will prove it with violence against another man, the man his wife had slept with.
Instead of such an extreme situation, how about one of a smaller scale? Suppose two school children, maybe middle schoolers, are getting into a fight. For what reason are they fighting? At this age, it could be based on relationships, but not like the man and his wife, something more applicable to this age range. Like, maybe one person might cheat on one another or say awful things. Name calling could be enough to create a fight in many individuals, and especially children. Yet, the question is, why is there the innate urge to fight? Why would something like name calling cause a feeling that one should fight? Chances are, the child feels insulted, like they are less than what they believe they are, and the means to proving that they are not as someone else claims, is to prove it with brute force. Why would this be the means to proving that the claims are false?
If we take another step back, at elementary school children now, why would they fight? The reasons are seemingly even less than what they were before. Name calling could be present, but it’s unlikely that any fights relating to relationships will happen. Even in simpler things to fight over, there is the fact that altercations still occur. Even a simple action like a child taking what another child believes to belong to them. It might be a crayon, or a book, or a ball. If one child takes something from another, without asking, acting as if it is theirs to take, the child losing the object can react in many ways, but one important one is fighting. They might immediately react with a punch, kick, or something of the like, in order to get the object back. Why might they do this? Well, it would be the means to obtaining what they believe to be theirs, and the cost would be exerting themselves to break down someone else in order to get that item back. Not all children act like this, but for the one’s who do, why?
It probably could be broken down to what their parents have taught them, or what they have perceived up until that point. Whether it be on the internet, television, books, or watching other people. If they have experienced a world where people fight to get what they want, to get anything, then they will attempt to replicate that type of living. It will seem rational to them, because what is rational is what is normal, what makes sense, what feels right. Especially at that stage in life, no one has told the child what better is, what they should think better is, I mean. These are nice ways to rationalize this type of behavior, but there still remains the fact that humans had to exist in order to perpetuate the angry and violent behavior, and we can’t ignore the reality that some children are violent even without clear influences. Thankfully, life is fundamentally violent, and in this most direct showcase of its violence, which many think is the only cause of violence, which helps us explain why this behavior comes about.
Violence in consumption is less to do with interactions between humans. It happens, but cannibalism is illegal, and even if it were legal, many are disgusted and revolted at such a proposition. The idea of eating their fellow man is revolting, and even if it were an available option to them, they would be disgusted if someone even suggested the idea. Despite this intense repulsion to eat the meat of their brothers, most love the idea of eating just about every other animal. They’ll eat cows, pigs, chickens, goats, sheep, deer, and many more without even considering the fact they’re eating another animal. It’s not my intent to shun those who enjoy eating meat, rather, I want to showcase that violence was required in order to obtain that meat.
There are human beings who, for their job, their career, literally murder animals. The animal product industry is not so pretty, but it isn’t my goal to outline how awful it is, but instead, to showcase that someone exists to kill the animals. Is this action not violent? If violence is established as something which can either be seen as the intent to cause harm or merely the causing of harm, or instead of harm, death, this must be seen as undeniably violent, yes? Things are dying at the hands of something else. Not only this, it is done at a rapid pace, and many things are being murdered. It’s not like every person slitting the throats of the animals enjoys doing it, some could, but it isn’t necessary, they just might be doing it because they don’t feel like they have a choice. Where this leads into, is the question of, how far does this idea of violence go?
Even in the clearly defined idea of violence, which has been made more general, it is hard to establish the extent of violence. The killing of another animal is undeniably violent, but if you are buying animal product and eating it in your own home, are you also violent? Is the participation in violence an action which makes one also violent, or really, more violent, than if they had not consumed that product? Well, you can’t not be violent, but the point is to establish grayness within violence. How violent must a human be? If we have consciousness, and we can influence others and ourselves to act in certain ways, this can be applied to what we believe to be right or wrong. It then, comes down to belief. Whether you believe your consumption of other animals to be violent or not is up to you. This is a bit lame, so we can try breaking it down just a touch further.
Instead, it can be focused on that in a capitalist society, money is the indicator of whether something stays or goes. If it brings in money, it stays, and if it brings in a lot of money, it grows. If it doesn’t bring in any money, it goes away, and something else is tried instead. In these circumstances, by purchasing animal product, one is actively choosing to perpetuate the violence, because they have chosen to promote that behavior with the choice of the direction of their dollar. To say this is right or wrong is not my place, but it is undeniably an action of violence, and it is in the direction of more violence, rather than less. Remember, this is in the context of individuals who can choose to eat or not eat meat. Some might ask, “What of those who have no choice but to eat meat?” And in those circumstances, the relative baseline for violence has changed, so they wouldn’t be more violent in that scenario, but thankfully, that’s basically no one in the modern day.
Violence is most associated with the ending of life. Whether with or without intention, it should be noted that it is nonetheless violent. This is the ending of one life by the actions of another, whether it means one thing absorbs another, one thing bites another, one thing infects another, or one shoots another. These all end in the same way, which is that, at the bare minimum, one life ends. Both lives can end too, like in a fight, or something along those lines. Most important of all, there does not need to be a conscious awareness of the actions taking place to label the encounter as violent. In any instance of actions moving towards the direction of death, it is then in a state of committing violence.
I would imagine for many people, the first images they think of when thinking about violence is war. Reasonably so, war is incredibly violent, and not only is it violent, it is foolish violence. Violence which only exists to breed more violence, more death and decay, only accelerating the path of destruction that is inevitable. It makes one wonder if those who order such wars genuinely understand what is being lost as a result of killing one another over things like land or resources. Indeed, humans have done a great job at committing as much violence as possible it seems, but just because they’ve done the most, at least in a way we can measure, and to our knowledge, does not mean other animals do not also commit violence.
Wolves hunt their prey, and they maw at the prey, and by working together, at least most of the time, it leads to the death of the meal they so viciously acquire. This is violent. Life is being ended, and there needn’t be reason for the ending of life to be considered violent, but in this case, there is. The wolves are in a state of needing food, because in order to perpetuate their life, they need to end the life of other things. Some have attempted to claim that because an animal, at least in this case, wolves, cannot be in any other state than animals that hunt, they are therefore not violent. If violence were merely the intentional means to the destruction of life because of a supposed higher purpose, then yes, but that is not a definition nor the definition of violence here. One might be able to scale that higher on my definition of violence, then, let’s say, a human punching another human. However, the idea is, violence is committed, and it causes the end of life, or there is intention for the life to be ended.
Human beings like to justify their violence. This could be noted as violence for a greater purpose, at least in the mind of the human being committing said violence. Already mentioned are things like war, where a human, or group of humans, decide to send their men to fight for some reason. The reasons could be money, resources, power, or really anything tangential to those main three. Violence as a result of piety of the religious kind is also common. This is a quality of violence that, as far as we know, is currently restricted to humans. No dog, cat, monkey, fox, wolf, or whatever animal you can think of is committing violence for a greater purpose. In the confines of justification of violence, it is restricted to humans, but other animals do and will fight, and those reasons are usually to do with hierarchy. Humans, are like this too, not to forget the example of the man who wanted to fight another man because he had slept with his wife.
These are all pretty high-level descriptions of violence. However, smaller actions that often get ignored are also violent, and it isn’t my goal to get to the bottom of violence, either. Instead, I’m focusing on many instances of violence, in order to showcase a pattern of violence in life. To go into the depths of why there is violence can only be briefly touched upon, and similarly, finding how deep the case of violence goes is currently not a goal. To continue the trend of describing violent actions, we can briefly look at some actions that many wouldn’t bat an eye at.
For example, you could step on ants, intentionally or unintentionally. This is killing life, and you can see the destruction of that life, if you look down. Smashing your foot upon ants will surely kill them, and many are actually content with this. Some enjoy killing ants, and they feel enjoyment in the destruction of life, at least in this case. These same people would never want to kill another human being, they probably wouldn’t even want to hurt another human, but they are so totally content with smashing ants up with their feet. Why? Really, I think it comes down to all things being violent, but also, because humans, at least these ones, love the idea of power. They fantasize over power, being powerful, and enforcing and showcasing their power in every which way. Funnily enough, the strongest and most notable showcase of power is violence, just as evil leaders would attempt to show their strength with war.
Whether you enjoy stomping or smashing ants or not, you cannot deny that you have ended life, and thus, you have committed high-level violent actions. These are high-level because you can perceive the change that has come as a result of your violence. Something on a lower level would be something no one considers violent, like using hand-sanitizer. It is anti-bacterial for a reason, it kills the bacteria, and by choosing to use that sanitizer, you have thus committed a violent action, because you have killed some large number of bacteria. Remember, it is violent because there is the ending of life, the actions taken to end that life play into the violence, but do not alone make the actions violent. These things can flip around too, like a bacteria attempting to kill you, or a parasite, or anything at such a small scale we can’t perceive it. Of course, we can use tools to perceive these things, but you don’t always have access to those tools, so in this particular case, when I mention a lack of perception, I just mean without the proper equipment.
In case you haven’t noticed another pattern, which helps support the idea that life is fundamentally violent, is that life grows as a result of death in other life. Human beings grow because they eat food and drink water, food has to be living to grow, and it has to die so that we may eat it. This goes for both plants and animals. Other animals follow this pattern, too. Even on the microscopic scale, microorganisms are consuming one another, or consuming something, because they need to in order to live. It is this constant cycle of death and life which supplements and supports the idea that life cannot exist without violence. If in the belief that life is fundamentally violent, or at the very least, death comes as a result of life requiring its continuation, how can this information be used in any practical sense?
If you’re the thinker type, it can enable you to start thinking of violence as another variable to consider when building up larger scale ideas. Some like to think, and sometimes I do as well, in a manner in which you build from the bottom to the top. You start at the fundamentals, the low-levels, and then build up to the higher levels of thought, and then there you can reach a conclusion to your thought or idea. A strong set of fundamentals is like concrete to a tall building. If you miss out on the foundation, your building will never be very tall. There are limits to this, to be sure, and even in this case, I have not mentioned the deepest levels of violence in life. While being a fundamental, a constant, know that it is the best we know now, and that likely will change in the future. However, if you’re not the thinker type, or you don’t think in that way, what else might there be for you?
It can be used as a justification or reason to explain why things act in ways we otherwise wouldn’t be able to explain. Perhaps a child is unusually violent, we then could apply the fundamental, of which is violence, and then promptly move on from the thought. This has many downsides, but the upside, in a practical sense, is that you don’t spend much time thinking about what you can’t understand or know. If this is some random child, you will never know why that child is acting in that particular way, there are so many variables at play, it’s hard to say that even the parents would know all the reasons. This is something to be checked upon often. This might come in handy, but every time you want to write something off as a fundamental, also know that there are things deeper going on than what you believe to be your fundamentals. What you think is the bottom is merely what you perceive as the bottom, and this means while you can write things off in order to save mental energy, know why you’re doing that, and don’t forget you’ve chosen to do that.
Being aware that life is fundamentally violent as a being with consciousness allows you to keep in check your violent behavior. There is a limit to this, we have to live, and I don’t believe you should stop living because you’re a violent being. It’s just part of being alive. However, due to being conscious, we can decide how violent we’re going to be, to a certain extent. If this is something that interests you, then actions you normally would have done could be omitted. You should obviously use hand-sanitizer, wash your hands, and keep clean, please keep killing germs. However, maybe consider things you do on a large scale. Like mentioned before, maybe you do not directly kill animals for their meat, but if you buy meat, you are thereby supporting the violent action of directly causing death. If this is something that doesn’t bother you, that’s okay, it usually doesn’t bother me either. Yet, you must keep in mind that’s a choice you’re making, and it’s important to admit you are making that choice, so that you don’t become disillusioned with how your actions cause death and violence for other beings. This might bring about better mental wellbeing, but like all things, don’t become excessive with it, but feel free to leave the ants alone next time.
A greater awareness also brings further reasonability into your thoughts and actions. If you were not previously aware of all things being violent, you might have not noticed how violent you are, because you are surrounded by violence, and all things are violent. With this awareness, you can then slow down your violence, or at least, be aware that it is taking place. You can then notice it within yourself, others, and the life that surrounds you. Understanding might be an indefinite spiral, but awareness does not have to be, as long as you’re aware of your inability to be fully aware.
While not comprehensively laying out all the ways life is violent, nor breaking life down, as much as we are aware, anyway, to showcase that violence, I have attempted to showcase violence in life on a higher-level. Meaning, life from what we can perceive, mostly without external tools. From animals to plants, these things are living and dying, and as a result of death, life prospers, to then age, and then die, which causes other life to prosper. The cycle repeats, and it only repeats through violence, because without violence, there would no death, thus there would be no life. I’ve tried to offer some pragmatic ideas that might enable one to use their awareness of violence’s fundamental quality in order to think better, or think less, or maybe alter your actions to be ones of decreased violent quality. While violence is generally noted as interactions between human beings, and rarely noted as something fundamental to life, it is so, and perhaps “violence” is not the best word for the phenomenon going on here. Until there is a proper word, I will associate my ideas to this word, within this particular context, with these particular definitions. I hope that you might consider the ways you might act violently, and the ways you can’t control that, but most importantly, notice the ways that you can. If you can decrease your violence, you can then destroy less of yourself and the world around you.